Month: May 2016

Before the current change of the World of Reality occurred, there was an incident between the World of Gods and the World of the Dead, and about a hundred years ago the extinction of the World of the Dead began from its upper parts to lower. It has been disappearing.

current 現在の

incident 出来事

extinction 消滅

Emissaries of God, especially dragon gods, in the upper parts of the World of the Dead were forced to choose between rising up to merge into God and passing into nothingness. Many of them, however, rejected the request and escaped to the World of Reality, possessing human beings and making them found new religions.

emissary 御使い

be forced to~ 〜するよう強いられる

merge 融合する

nothingness 無

reject 拒む

found 創設する

Among the escaping emissaries, there was a powerful dragon god. The dragon god possessed a man and he became a certain founder of a new religion in Showa era. The dragon god was in a position where it could observe the World of Gods. It had antlers like a deer and was a big black dragon. Such a dragon with antlers was few in those days as well as these days.

observe 見る

antler 角

as well as A Aだけでなく

This dragon god hated to merge into God, thinking “If I am to be extinct, I want to go down to the World of Realty to try my strength.” Then it escaped from the World of Dragons lying between the World of Gods and the World of Reality.

extinct 消滅した

strength 力

Scenting this escape of the dragon god, the World of Gods sent another dragon god to obstruct the escape. The escaping dragon god survived the big battle against the other dragon god and as the result lost its eye and managed to go down to Mt.Kamiyama（神山）in the World of Reality at midnight. The thunder and rain around Mt. Kamiyama must’ve been very hard like eruption.

scent 察知する

obstruct 妨げる

manage to~ どうにかして〜する

eruption 噴火

One day, the dragon god set eye on the founder and possessed him when he was middle-aged. In those days the World of the Dead was so influential that the possession was so intense as to change the form of a physical body. As soon as he was possessed by it, the founder fell ill and went blind of one eye because the dragon god had one eye. Also, he must’ve been troubled by the illusion that antlers arise from the top of his head.

set eye on A Aに目をつける

middle-aged 中年の

trouble 悩ます

illusion 幻想

This one-eyed dragon told the founder what it peeked at in the World of Gods, such as “the change from day to night” that is, the transition from the age of the World of the Dead to that of the Sun, and “the purification by the sun”, or the selection and evolution of human beings by the spiritual light of the sun.

peek 盗み見する

transition 移行

purification 浄化

selection 選別

evolution 進化

The dragon god, however, had made a big, fundamental mistake. It told the founder that the talisman he wrote was God, making him worship it. The talisman was possessed with part of the spirit of the dragon god and was to squash up the Inner God of each human beings who worship it. Though the dragon god conveyed the purification by the sun, it propagated the contradictory deed which weeds out people during the purification.

fundamental 根本的な

squash up A Aを閉じ込める

propagate 広める

contradictory 矛盾した

weed out A 淘汰する

After the founder died, he noticed his mistake and tried in vain to tell his religious group to amend the teaching. He is in a certain place of the World of the Dead because he propagated the wrong teaching to shut up the Inner God of each person. He won’t be able to get out of it and rest in peace unless the believers leave the religion and have their Inner God appear.

in vain 無駄に

amend 修正する

unless S+V SがVしない限り

What the founder wants to say now is the following:

● To eat a little natural food could renew your physical body, when your spiritual body will play the main role.

● Worship your Inner God, not a physical object.

He is saying to me “To practice these things enables human beings to survive the great purification of the sun.”

make A into B AをBに作り変える

object 対象

enable 可能にする

The things above are what I’ve got when I remembered and read spiritually the picture of the founder I saw at a book store a long time ago. I’ve never read his books or teachings before, so there might be a mistake in my description of him.

description 描写

I’ve avoided making a comment about founders of religions or religious groups because I can see the spiritual beings behind them. But there are two reasons for my description of the founder. One is that he had the role at the beginning of the Showa period of informing people of the great purification of the sun to come. The other is that though most of the spiritual beings behind new religions are snake spirits, the spiritual being behind the founder was an influential dragon.

inform A of B AにBを伝える

influential 大物の

The one-eyed black dragon, having been very active in the World of Reality, is gone. It returned to nothingness with the end of the centuries of Dragon gods. After the great purification of the sun, this world will enter the centuries of Phoenix.

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“Worship God, Respect Ancestors” （敬神崇祖）occurred to me today, which Mr. Matsuzo Matsushita （松下松蔵）advocated. He was called “god-man” or “mystery person” in Showa era. I don’t know how he explained the phrase, but I interpret it as “Worship God with the utmost courtesy and step back because God is so awful. Be thankful to and intimate with your ancestors.” I think the phrase is really good.

occur to A Aの頭に思い浮かぶ

advocate 唱える

era 時代

explain 説明する

interpret 解釈する

utmost 最大限の

courtesy 礼儀正しさ

thankful 感謝に満ちて

intimate 親しい

Because emissaries of God, or Outer God, were active between the World of Gods and the World of Reality, it was important to keep them at a distance. If you had made light of them, they would have got angry. However, they’re now disappearing and a new age is beginning when the true holy spirit resides in human beings as Inner God. People in general don’t know in which shrine an outer god is, so every time you visit a shrine you had better be courteous and offer gratitude only. Visiting a shrine is greeting your Inner God. Shinto shrines all over Japan are for this purpose and are sacred places.

emissary 御使い

keep A at a distance Aと距離を置く

slight 軽んじる

reside 宿る

courteous 礼儀正しい

gratitude 感謝の気持ち

sacred 神聖な

It can be said that Inner God is a living thing in your heart. To suffer from things happening in this World of Reality and hurt your heart, or Inner God, would cause your physical body to get a disease. Your fortune would also decline. Because the state of your Inner God is sure to have influence on your physical body, it’s best for you to have gratitude consciously no mattar what happens to you. To raise and develop the living thing called heart by having gratitude will lead you to be well in body and mind fundamentally, which is quite different from the case where you feel better temporarily due to the spiritual dirt of a healer.

suffer 苦しむ

hurt 傷つける

cause A to~ Aが〜する原因となる

disease 病気

fortune 運気

decline 弱まる

state 状態

be sure to~ 必ず〜する

consciously 意識的に

raise 育てる

fundamentally 根本的に

temporarily 一時的に

“Worship Gods, Respect Ancestors” reminded me of Mr. Matsuzo Matsushita, so I will introduce one of his interesting anecdotes for you. It is said that he never ate eel. According to him, the reason was that eels worship the rising sun without fail. It might be possible that eels raise their head above the water and turn to the sun at dawn. Biologically speaking, there are a lot of mysteries about eels. I think creatures are rare which are able to live in both sea water and fresh water. Personally, eel has not been my favorite food somehow since a long time ago due to its strange taste. This may be because I have eaten only cheap eel. When it is served, I eat it with gratitude, though.

remind A of B AにBを思い出させる

anecdote 逸話

eel うなぎ

without fail 必ず

dawn 明け方

rare 珍しい

somehow どういうわけか

As in holy domestic fouls at Ise Grand Shrine（伊勢神宮）, I feel that creatures that respond to the rising sun are often emissaries of God. Getting up early may be more and more important for human beings. People working night shifts might as well go to bed after worshiping the rising sun. But you don’t have to push yourself. It’s much more important to remind yourself of gratitude in everyday life.

domestic foul 鶏

respond 反応する

might as well~ 〜した方がよいのかもしれない

everyday life 日常生活

生かして頂いて ありがとう御座位ます

I Ka Shi Te I Ta Da I Te A Ri Ga To U Go Za I Ma Su

Thank you so much for keeping me/us alive.

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I went to the dentist yesterday for dental tartar removal for the first time in one year. I visited there two times to complete the removal. As I am in my forties, the maintenance of teeth is important. I think if you don’t feel any pain during the treatment, it might not be effective. I don’t know anything about dentistry, but I think dental scaling must be so painful that gums breed. I’m going to say the dentist next time “Please remove my tartar much harder without hesitation.” I feel, spiritually too, teeth are so important as to affect your life. It seems that they’re involved in human life and longevity more than you can imagine.

dental tartar 歯石

removal 除去

effective 効果的な

dentistry 歯学

gums 歯茎

breed 出血する

influence 影響

longevity 寿命

In the waiting room of the dental clinic, I was thinking about the reason why I had got the inspiration that teeth equal death. In the case of wild animals, problems with their teeth lead to their death from hunger. Human beings in ancient times also must have died from the lack of stamina as their teeth decreased in number. I think one of the reasons that the average life expectancy has increased in the modern society is due to the improvement of dental treatment techniques. I feel sorry for people in poor countries who cannot receive appropriate dental treatment. It makes me feel really sorry for them to think that they are suffering from toothache.

lead to A Aをもたらす

hunger 飢え

lack 欠如

decrease 減る

life expectancy 平均寿命

due to A Aが原因である

improvement 改善

feel sorry かわいそうに思う

In Japan, the number of young people who won’t or cannot work has been increasing rapidly. Since they don’t lead a well-regulated life, they are likely to be negligent of bushing their teeth and as a result suffer from bad teeth or a periodontal disease. I think suppurative microorganisms around the root of a tooth dissolve bones and invade the whole body. They will affect brain cells and cause the thinking ability to drop. Also, they will affect the heart through blood and decrease strength. Looking spiritually at the teeth of many sages of the past, I can see their teeth were mostly very pretty when they were young. The teeth of Buddha look really beautiful in my spiritual vision, and so do the teeth of Ramana Maharshi.

well-regulated 規則正しい

negligent 怠った

periodontal disease 歯周病

suppurative 化膿性の

dissolve 溶かす

invade 侵攻する

cell 細胞

ability 能力

mostly たいていは

It is said that a palm reading can tell the longevity, but it is the state of teeth and gums that can tell the longevity much more accurately. It is likely that there are some experienced dentists who can tell how long their patients will live and the name of a disease from which they die because they have seen a lot of patients enough to know the relationship between the state of their teeth and their longevity. It’s a hundred times as good for your physical and spiritual body to go to the dentist as you pay a lot of money to eccentric psychics or healers.

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Eating with someone else is important. The phrase would often be used in Japan of “fellows who eat from the same bowl.” Spiritually speaking, it forms a connection with each other to share food at the same time and in the same place.

would often ~ よく〜したものだった

fellow 仲間

connection つながり

Why is sharing the same food important? Physically, eating the same food has the same influence on each one who eats it, to be sure. But what I feel about the spiritual connection which arises in sharing food is not the effects of the food itself.

physically 身体的には

influence 影響

arise 生じる

effect 効果

For example, in a cafeteria of a company, its employees eat their lunch box, breadstuff bought at a convenience store or what they order from the cafeteria menu at the same period of time. At this time an aura of the same color and a sense of solidarity are arising there.

employee 従業員

aura オーラ

a sense of solidarity 一体感

When an outsider or a person who is spiritually sensitive gets into the cafeteria a little late, he may hesitate with a feeling that he doesn’t belong to the place. But as such a person eats there every day, he/she will assimilate the aura and come to feel nothing about it.

sensitive 敏感な

hesitate 躊躇う

belong to A Aに属する

assimilate 同化する

come to~ 〜するようになる

That is, eating at the same time and in the same place rather than food itself generates something spiritually common. When I thought about this, an idea came into my mind that eating is an act of three elements, namely energy of food, energy of place and a spiritual body, being combined.

that is つまり

rather than A Aよりもむしろ

generate 発生させる

act 行為

combine 合わせる

Rice was the staple food for Japanese. Rice is a mass of the holy energy of Ameterasu-oho-mi-kami（天照太御神）, the Sun Goddess. And the energy of a place is the energy of the ground, that is, the energy of Kunitokotachi-o-kami（国常立太神）, the spirit of the earth. Therefore eating rice is the act of these two kinds of energy and the energy of your spiritual body being combined into one. To speak exaggeratedly, you’re merging into those gods every time you eat rice.

the staple food 主食

mass 塊

exaggeratedly 大げさに

merge 溶け込む

If you change the place you eat, the same food tastes different because the energy of place is different. A rice ball eaten in nature and one eaten in a room is different. So, fellows who eat from the same bowl are the ones who share the unity of man and god at the same time in the same place. It may be very sacred to share the act of taking in food at the same time, like Last Supper of Jesus Christ.

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According to news reports, the price of gasoline has risen to 160 yen per litter. As I don’t want to encounter traffic congestion on Golden Week, early-may holiday season in Japan, I convinced my family that we should go to some nearby place on holiday.

encounter 遭遇する

congestion 渋滞

convince 説得する

What is petroleum? I gave it a thought. There are many theories about the origin of petroleum, but I imagine that a huge amount of mineral in the depth of the earth and the microorganisms that arise when creatures, such as animals and dinosaurs, and plants decompose, react to each other and mature over millions of years to form crude petroleum, and that microorganisms and germs dissolve stone, or carbon component, in ever-lasting time.

petroleum 石油

theory 説

mineral 鉱物

microorganism 微生物

decompose 分解する

mature 熟成する

crude petroleum 原油

dissolve 溶かす

The idea is fun that crude petroleum is made from blood of dinosaurs. Spiritual bodies of dinosaurs might be moving cars and planes in the modern age. Filmed from the air, traffic congestion during Golden Week looks as if a huge dragon with a long body were lying. Monster birds that existed on earth in ancient times are actually flying in the sky in form of superalloy airplanes. It’s like they’re reproducing their brave figure of the past in modern times.

monster bird 怪鳥

superalloy 合金の

reproduce 再現する

assert oneself 自己主張する

I feel that creatures that lived in the past are asserting themselves in another form to tell they did exist in the world. Our human bodies will have changed in the distant future, but our mind will never have. Probably we will be trying to tell others that we did live in this world somehow. This is also true of ancestral spirits. When they feel they’re forgotten, they try to assert themselves. So all their descendants have to do is take notice of their existence before they assert themselves. Then everything would be fine.

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A reader of this blog pointed out that he was able to use a menu stand used in a restaurant to erect a tanzaku（短冊）, a strip of Japanese paper. I thought it’s an unexpected idea. I think any stand will do that is made from natural material like wood and can fix a tanzaku. But when you use a menu stand, the stability of the tanzaku and its angle have to be taken care of.

point out A Aを指摘する

erect 直立させる

unexpected 予想外の

material 素材

stability 安定感

My tanzaku stand is made from bamboo. Two half-cut bamboo tubes with slit are arranged so as to fix the tanzaku from both sides. It’s a simple stand . I bought it at a department store, I think. Wooden fibers are good for spirits to come close to and stay there. If there were a tanzaku made from hemp fibers, it would be the best.

bamboo 竹

slit 切れ目

fiber 繊維

hemp 麻

Other plants which are easy for spirits to come close to are bamboo and willow trees. For example, fortunetellers of divination use thin bamboo sticks to tell somebody’s fortune. This is because the bamboo sticks act as an antenna making it easy for the fortunetellers to sympathize with their guardian spirit. Also, in Japanese ghost stories, a ghost often appears under the willow tree. I feel willow trees also easily sympathize with something spiritual.

willow 柳

fortuneteller 占い師

divination 易

fortune 運勢

guardian spirit 守護霊

sympathize 感応する

Speaking of willow trees, I remember a TV program I saw a long time ago featuring eccentric persons of the world. There was a shaman in a certain village of Southeast Asia. He can cure diseases when the spirit of Cho Hakkai（猪八戒） possesses him. Normally he is a quiet person. But once he is lost in meditation in front of an altar, he begins to dance suddenly. Then he grabs willow twigs and check his patient’s body from head to toe using the twigs like a telescope. There is no hole in the twigs, of course. And the moment he finds a diseased part, he starts, shivers, turns around and shouts with joy (lol). The diseased part is a little bit heaped under the skin and when he pushes it, needles and nails come out of it. He does this weird thing, shouting in a shrill voice. He looks funny and lovable in a way. I remember the scene sometimes, and every time I mimic him before my families, they laugh.

feature 特集する

eccentric person 奇人

Southeast Asia 東南アジア

disease 病気

meditation 瞑想

altar 祭壇

twig 枝

telescope 望遠鏡

the moment S+V SがVするやいなや

start ビクッとする

shiver 震える

heaped 盛り上がって

needle 針

nail 釘

shrill voice 甲高い声

mimic まねをする

When a patient’s disease is cured, he/she gives some food for the shaman in return. The true identity who brought about this surprising phenomenon of materialization was a spiritual being of the World of the Dead whose figure was like a big wild boar. It seems that the spirit came from a deep forest and possessed him and that the spirit used to be a natural spirit and just wanted offerings. This spirit didn’t seem to be a vicious one who eats human souls. But the problem is most of the patients were repeaters. The spiritual being of the World of the Dead made them come back to the shaman over and over for the purpose of getting offerings. This is one of the bad characteristics of spiritual beings who bring about bizarre spiritual phenomena.

in return お返しに

true identity 正体

bring about A Aを引き起こす

phenomenon 現象

materialization 物質化

figure 形状

wild boar 猪

offering 供物

vicious 悪意のある

characteristic 特徴

Well, I don’t remember the last time I went to a hospital to see a doctor. I think it was a long time ago, when I caught a cold. Normally people don’t want to go to the hospital. They don’t become repeaters except in the case of particular diseases. Yet in the case of spiritual healing, people are sure to become repeaters. They don’t feel there is something wrong with being a repeater and are willing to come to the healer over and over again. To the eye of others, such people look poorer and poorer, whereas they have the illusion that they are full of energy. Don’t you think it strange that healers who pretend that they can cure all diseases have a lot of repeaters as customers ? The truth is healers make them repeaters by attaching unnecessary spiritual dirt to them.

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I searched information about the custom of Shimekazari（注連飾り）peculiar to Ise（伊勢） region. According to Ise Tourist Association,

Walking along the streets of Ise, you will often find Shimekazari hanging over the main entrance of a house. A wooden tag with “蘇民将来子孫家門” or “笑門” or “千客萬来” written in Japanese ink on it is attached to Shimekazari. Hornbeam and Gleichenia japonica are decorated on both sides of it. Normally, Shimekazari, put up on New Year’s day, is detached in a few days, but in Ise（伊勢） and Shima（志摩） regions, they have the custom of keeping Shimekazari decorated over the entrance gate all through the year. This is due to the legend that a long, long time ago Susanoo（スサノオ） visited this area and a poor but merciful man named Sominshourai（蘇民将来）offered him a room. When leaving, Susanoo told him that if he kept a wooden talisman over the entrance gate, he could protect your descendants from epidemics forever. To hear that, people there began to put the talisman as the evidence of their being his descendants, hoping for sound health. So Shimekazari is a talisman for the safety and well-being of the family. Also, it is said that “蘇民将来” was shortened to “将門” later and then to “笑門” because of “将門 ” was the name of Taira No Masakado（平将門）, who is legendarily supposed to bring bad luck.

search 調べる

custom 慣習

peculiar 特有の

region 地方

attach 付ける

detach 取り外す

due to A Aが原因である

legend 伝説

talisman 魔除け

descendant 子孫

epidemic 疫病

evidence 証拠

When I read this, a vision came into my mind. When I searched information about the image, I found that it was linked to Passover, a festival of Judaism. Passover is an important festival of Judaism. The tradition traces back to a night about 3500 years ago, when Hebrews, who were prisoners of, and were badly treated by, Egyptians, tried to escape from Egypt the next day, led by the Prophet Moses. Yahweh, the highest God of Hebrews, whose true identity is Kunitokotachi-o-kami（国常立太神）, told Moses that all boys in Egypt who were to be the successor of his family and all first baby animals shall die suddenly from the plague as punishment for killing his beloved people.

Passover 過越の祭

Judaism ユダヤ教

trace back 遡る

Hebrew ヘブライ人

prophet 預言者

true identity 正体

successor 後継者

plague 疫病

punishment 罰

But the angry god told Moses how to avoid the fatal plague, too. Following his prediction, Hebrews spread blood of lambs all over two pillars in front of their entrance gate and the lintel of their house and painted a sign of blood on the gate with a leaf of hemp. Around the midnight of the day they were to escape from Egypt, all eldest sons in Egypt whose house had no sign of blood died suddenly, including the successor to the throne of the Egyptian dynasty.This is how only Hebrews whose house had the sign of blood were able to pass over the calamity. Passover was named after the legend.

fatal 致死の

lamb 子羊

lintel 鴨居

hemp 麻

eldest son 長男

dynasty 王朝

calamity 災難

I wrote in an article of this blog how Moses landed up in Japan and buried Tablets of Stone under the ground of Taganomiya（多賀宮）in Geku（外宮）of Ise Grand Shrine（伊勢神宮）. He seems to have been welcomed by the people in Ise as Susanoo（スサノオ）. I feel that hefty Hebrews coming together with Moses, who pushed a big cart with Moses and Tablets of Stone on it, were described as Sarutahikono-kami（猿田彦神）with a big nose and strong body. It was right spiritually for the people to see Moses as Susanoo because Moses had part of the spirit of Susanoo inside. Geku of Ise Grand Shrine is a sacred place for the holy spirit linked with Amenominakanushi-no-kami（天之中主神）= O-Kunitokotachi-o-kami（大国常立太神）and Kunitokotachi-o-kami=Yahweh or Susanoo.

article 記事

Tablets of Stone 十戒石

hefty 屈強な

describe 描写する

sacred 神聖な

Yahweh, the revengeful, stern god who came down to the Middle East in ancient times, is Kunitokototachi-o-kami. The angry and lamenting spiritual being who gave a catastrophic revelation about the end of the world in the past 100 years in Japan was also Kunitokotachi-o-kami. The way this god manifests itself is harsh. To appease this holy spirit, it is necessary that we sublimate him by having 5 percent of all human beings remind themselves of gratitude and that we send him back to his parental god. I’m looking forward to the day a lot of Jewish people and religious men visit Geku of Ise Grand Shrine from all over the world.

stern 厳格な

the Middle East 中東

catastrophic 破滅的な

revelation 神示

harsh 過酷な

appease なだめる

sublimmate 昇華する

remind A of B AにBを思い出させる

Jewish ユダヤの

religious 宗教の

An orange attached to the present Shimekazari stands for the blood of lambs. I feel that Shimekazari in ancient times used to have two woven ropes like two DNA chains hanging together with hemp fibers dyed red. There is a deep meaning in old customs, isn’t there?